Archive for September, 2011

The afflicted and the faithful have long made pilgrimages to the quiet country site where Belgian immigrant Adele Brise said in 1859 that she saw the Virgin Mary three times. For the past few years, maybe 30 or 50 people had trickled in daily to visit the chapel, Brise’s grave and the candlelit crypt that marks the site of the apparition.

That changed in December, when Bishop David Ricken of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Green Bay certified after investigations by three theologians that Brise had indeed seen a beautiful lady in white who said she was the “queen of heaven.”

That made the shrine, which is a mile from the unincorporated town of Champion, the USA’s only official site where Mary is said to have appeared.

Now there’s a steady flow of traffic into the recently enlarged gravel parking lot. Cars, vans and buses bring 500 people — and often many more — here daily. License plates from Ohio, Minnesota, Missouri, Illinois and Indiana were spotted one recent weekday.

[…]

The farming area around the shrine is changing already.

“If the rumors are right, it’s going to look like downtown Chicago pretty soon,” says Louie Gomand, who owns a farm adjacent to the shrine.

A farm stand on his property sells vegetables and water to visitors. A sunflower costs 50 cents and a gourd 35 cents. A handwritten sign reads “bus specials.” There’s a lot more traffic, he says, but he has no complaints.

Neither does Kelli Vissers, 34. She and her husband, David, 38, own two buildings in Champion. “Since the shrine happened” in December, “the traffic has quadrupled through here,” she says.

They have converted a small trailer into the mobile On the Way Cafe. Kelli Vissers said she hopes to cater meals for tourists and turn one of the buildings into a bed-and-breakfast and the other into a full-scale cafe.

Barb Cornette, 58, who grew up in the area and now helps run a dairy farm a couple of miles from the shrine, says some residents have mixed feelings about its growing popularity.

“Traffic has increased tremendously,” she says. “Some of the area farmers that are retired want to sell their land … for possibly a hotel, a restaurant. They’re looking for the gold mine, unfortunately,” she says.

…………..

The Roman Catholic Church never did a thorough inspection of into this one, unfortunately.On the afternoon of the fifth of April, 1997, Police Officer Chico Rodriquez noticed a strange shape seemingly painted on the back of a road sign. The sign was located near Sunnyside, Washington, at the intersection of Washington Sate 241 and the Yakima Valley Highway. He described the shape as a silhouette of the profile of a woman, he identified as the Virgin Mary. The Virgin wore a dress with ruffles. Some said they saw that her hands were clasped together, but most could not make out her face clearly. Word spread throughout the predominately Hispanic Catholic community. Within a few hours, over a thousand people had gathered to look at the sign.

Many came with flowers, which they laid beside the sign. Others lit candles and prayed. The crowd was so large that the State Patrol closed the road intersection for several hours. Other members of the faithful looked at other road signs nearby, and a few said they saw the Madonna’s image there too. One person claimed to have seen the image of the Virgin on a road sign near Moses Lake, one hundred miles away.

Maybe they should. Everyone should start lobbying on behalf of their church signs and toaster images, and the Church should liberalize its process to give boost s to local economies.

I suppose if you placed all those arrows around on a list of up and down on the Presidential candidates, you would — just this minute — have a down arrow for Candidate Perry and Bachmann, and an up arrow for Romney, Cain, and McCotter. The other candidates are in a perma-standstill.

Which is interesting. A week ago conventional wisdom was something that Perry had displaced Bachmann who had displaced Cain. And maybe Perry was starting to fade a little even in this rubric. But then Cain just won a Florida straw poll… with, like, the vote count along the lines of the attendance of a Screaming Trees concert.

I’ve zoned out of this matter a bit more than usual over the last couple of weeks. There have been two debates — the headlines show Perry and Bachmann nicking at each other over fruit-loop posturing on vaccines. Ron Paul throws an assist in there. And Romney bludgeoning Perry over comments about Social Security being a Ponzi scheme, the better to check him in Florida. I guess it was someone with the Romney campaign who blew around and placed posters of a satirical nature about Perry’s comments in the boxes of the city’s alt weeklies. (Note: This is a joke. Those print-outs are liberal / Democratic based.)

And Thaddeus McCotter is tweeting about HIS jump to 1 percent in the polls… that’s THAD-MENTUM! Or … statistical noise in being found in a poll.

In other cross candidate news — Ron Paul fans note that Newt Gingrich said History will include Ron Paul. And history probably should — there’s a chock-o voter bloc convinced that the EPA is out to poison them and it’s things like that that show the political accomplishments of Ron Paul.

Two stories about the Presidential contest come up once so often — whenever its principal actor puts out a press release, or whenever a columnist decides to point to it.

Ralph Nader is searching for a Democratic Primary candidate to run against Obama. The last time I checked out of the story, Mike Gravel had announced that your contributions would throw his hat into the ring — this didn’t seem to go anywhere. Now Ralph Nader has upped the stakes and grabbed a bunch of signatories to his project — progressive groups, a few former Democratic Senators from the 1970s, Corner West who has been engaging in an interesting debate that’s been sensationalized, the former editor of Harpers, and…

Ross Perot’s 1996 Vice Presidential Candidate! Yes, I spot that man on the list. Interesting. Last I saw Pat Choate was 2000 and he was on Nightline defending Pat Buchanan, debating John Hagelin. He apparently helped Buchanan into the Reform Party. Looking him up on wikipedia, I do not know that Pat Choate is anything except against NAFTA — but, whatever.

Well, I suppose that last one makes sense in the way that Ralph Nader made some positive noise about the positive influence on the body politik of one Sarah Palin. Just… to annoy everyone, I suppose.

The other big news is this Centrist Third Party contraption. It received another crack from that David Broder — Thomas Friedman axis. Their analysis doesn’t take into account the grappling of politicos to this “Non Partisan” edict. They’re moving ahead — ballot by ballot… thinking that a Democratic Party president with high negatives and a Republican opponent with high negatives can give them some sliver “Center” wave — something a Charlie Crist once aimed at.

Hm. Ross Perot. Rummaging under that engine, was his metaphor. Cranking up the mechanics. Fire away.

When these things break out — Larouche Wikipedia Team Offensives — I always end up with a sense of contradiction: I see why this matters, at the same time I see why it really doesn’t matter. Basically why I get that sense of “it doesn’t matter” comes around the bend where they don’t have the need to delete sentences about them seeing themseles as the only people stopping the collapse of human civilization.

And so we go. A semi-minor matter of Roy Frankhouser, where we have some parsing of matters here. Deletions crossed, additions in brackets and italicized

Frankhouser said [they] he persuaded a friend to play a former top CIA official, “Mr. Ed” in meetings with Larouche [associates] who, according to Larouche group lawyers, came to believe they had a direct line of communication to the White House and Kremlin through Mr. Ed as “a national resource in security matters” — and were immune from prosecution.

Precision. Larouche never met Mr. Ed?

The question of “associates” gets rather hilarious in some other edits. The gist of the latest batch of wikipedia edits come down to wanting to deal away the threats to Girvin and a variety of threatening behavior to reporters — particularly in the 1980 New Hampshire Primary, and a reference in the Franklin Cover-Up Caper.

And we have a removal of a reference to Larouche being accompanied by “armed guards” is traded in for “several of his associates” in describing a “tense encounter with a New Hampshire journalist”.

We land in a loopy land where the Larouche wikipedia teams slides into a sort of case of selective existential crisis in the “Verify sourcing” question. Okay, let’s see the deletions:

Reporters, campaign workers, and party officials received calls from people impersonating reporters or ADL staff members who asked questions including about what “bad news” they had heard about Larouche. Return calls reportedly showed that the reported callers were imposters.

Governor Hugh Gallen and State Attorney General Thomas Rath both received harassing phone calls “day and night.”

When he reported the incident, he found one of his cats dead on his doorstep the following morning, and another dead cat on each of the subsequent days the series ran. [Note: they added “A Larouche associate denied responsibility for the dead cats.]

According to courtroom testimony by FBI agent Richard Egan, the head of Larouche’s security unit boasted of placing harassing phone calls all through the night to the general counsel of the Federal Elections Commission in which the FEC was investing Larouche’s political contributions.

When a Catholic Priest refused to sign, a young Larouche follower accused him of being homosexual. Another signature gatherer shouted “You are going to get AIDs” to a woman who would not sign. There was an altercation between a member of the public and a Larouche follower allegedly standing beside a poster that said “Kill the Faggots. Kill Elizabeth Taylor” which resulted in battery charges.

In 2009, Larouche followers who were protesting Barack Obama’s healthcare reform proposal stood outside a Trader Joe’s grocery store in Irvine, California wearing swastikas, bringing some shoppers to tears. Followers called those who disagreed “bitches” and “Hitler lovers”. Some arguments grew heated and on several occasions police were called to remove the Larouche followers.

While Girvin was being interviewed on a sidewalk by a tv reporter, someone walked behind her and said “Polly, you’re going to die” which the reporter soaid sounded like a threat.
[Added: Due to that and what she said were other threatening behaviors, Girvin gave up her practice, sold her home, and left the state.]

Larouche said that a US Attorney who was investigating the movement [Weld] “does not deserve to live. He should have a bullet between the eyes,” according to a statement given to the FBI by
[Good time to note the larouche wiki teams’ comical work with Frankhouser — to impugn a very impugnable figure.]

The Omaha question:
According to experts quoted by the Omaha-World Herald, Larouche’s motive for involvement was to justify phone solicitations raising money to combat child abuse in Nebraska.
According to one report, experts stated that Larouche’s involvement in the matter allowed his phone solicitors to raise money by saying they needed money to fight child abuse in Nebraska.

Removed some notations: Resident Anthropologist removed the Red Letter Press pamphlet as a “dubious publisher”, a new piece “Who are the Traitors and who are the Heroes” as “Barely mentions Larouche” (and, really, hard to object), and an article about the Larouchies disrupting a Dean event. Also seen that customary removal effort for Dennis King’s book and the “revisions on random websites” not “RS and SPS”.

I am sympathetic to this:
“My quick reaction is that threatening and spooky tactics of the movement, in aggregate, are significant and there is already a huuuuge section of that. Each specific incident is typically disconnected, though, and few of them by themselves are all that important.” — Wikidemon.

Girven incident is important. And after a pause I think about it, reading through the batch of Larouche news articles, and think… this is the stuff that the Larouche Movement is made of, and the “Values in Conflict” we have (the “seems to dry up in the 1990s problem” throws you the problems you have to deal with.

Meanwhile, I sense the Larouche Wikipedia team — or maybe the I can call that editor the “See no Evil” enabler wikipedian in deference to “Assume Good Faith” dictates — floats around the “Warn you the last chance” on a “Revert War” to Will Beback. It’s a project for the Larouche wikipedia team, though I’m guessing sans Will Beback, something would fill the void.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living-persons/Noticeboard#LaRouche_Movement (Though, this one bounces with the odd problem of what is a Larouche Movement and why a Republican Party is not a personality cult — funny, something reminds me of Alan Osler here…)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:LaRouche_movement#Revert_warring

STORY NUMBER TWO:

To demonstrate my point – – Where in local media is there any coverage– blurb perhaps, paid announcement? — of the Larouche Movement holding a NAWAPA conference in Kennewick, Washington?

One step in this, I suppose… everyone’s joining the fight.:
A Call for Unification of World leaders from Scientific and Government Institutions Worldwide

The NAWAPA plan, or something like it, is definitely in the works.We explain this at the Water War Crimes web site. http://www.waterwarcrimes.comThe key agreements were signed under cover of the 2010 Olympics, in Vancouver, when Governors frrom US Western States travelled to Canada and signed what were called “:green energy agreements” which is “code” for water agreements. Immediately afterwards, the British Columbia government announced it would proceed to construct a huge reservoir that has been delayed for over 30 years and, about the same time, the Premiers of Canada’s western [provinces announced that, henceforth, they would be stewards for water for all of North America.Queen Elizabeth then came to her Canadian colony, in the summer of 2010, for ten days and had high level meetings with Canada’s federal government in Ottawa. She departed and travelled to New York City where, in our opinion, she delivered key rights of way documents and other concessions that would legally permit the project to proceed on a sound legal footing. It was her first visit to New York in 35 years.This year, 2011, Prince William came to his mothers Canadian colony, for 10 days, left, and travelled to California where he had private meetings with Governor Gerry Brown which, assuredly, included discussions about water.Water exports from Canada is a very sensitive subject so to everything is being done secretly.The process is underway and it will be a huge public works project that will see rivers of clean fresh water diverted to south western USA and northern Mexico.The Water War Crimes web site is devoted to exposing and explaining these issues and paints a true but sad story of high level legal, political and judicial corruption in Canada by insiders who tried to corner the monopoly.There are now 26 sudden deaths linked to the Water War Crimes. These are discussed on the web page entitled the Graveyard of the Guilty.http://www.waterwarcrimes.com/grave-yard-of-the-guilty—twenty-six-insider-witnesses–defendants-suddenly-die.htmlThe most disturbing death is that of Michel Trudeau, son of former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. This appears to have been a ritual murder for reasons that are discussed on the web site.

The plot thickens!

STORY NUMBER THREE

The best I can come up with is the Larouche Movement’s side trip to Walla Walla.

“We put a mustache on Rand Paul,” said one of the LaRouche activists, who declined to give her name. “A lot of people deserve the Hitler mustache.” […]

. The women who visited Whitman on Friday traveled from Seattle to Eastern Washington in order to attend a LaRouche conference in Kennewick.

But the dialogue was amongst students; neither students nor the activists felt that a discussion had occurred between them.

“I haven’t heard one actual argument,” said a LaRouche member. “I’m really disappointed in this college.”

Senior Katie DeCramer also expressed disappointment.

“It’s really important to conduct these kind of discussions with respect, and I haven’t seen that,” she said. “From both [the students and the activists’] sides. But I’m happy that people are talking.”

Dateline LA JOLLA, Calif. —A picture of President Barack Obama with a Hitler-style mustache is causing concern and outrage in downtown La Jolla.At the corner of Wall Street and Ivanhoe Avenue, political activists are asking La Jolla residents and visitors to impeach the President, showing two pictures of Obama: one with a mustache and the other, in a straight jacket.Yelling from behind a table, the two young men from Los Angeles are trying to grab the attention of everyone they can, even if they are ignored.

MASS STRIKE REACTIONS:
So there’s a couple nutty activist somewhere. Is this only being reported because they’re doing their thing in La Jolla?
The LaRouchies have to pull stunts like this to get any attention. I got to know more than I ever wanted to know about them when I lived in the Virginia community they “invaded” when Lyndon LaRouche bought an estate them. They’re real troublemakers and total nuts. It’s hard to know where to place them on the political spectrum, other than exceptionally strange nuts somewhere out in outer space.
On the other hand, at least we know LaRouche is a crook. In a way, that makes him an honest candidate.
POINT / COUNTERPOINT time
Point: It’s not too far fetched, anyway. He’s a Dictator hell bent on ruining our country and he clearly is anti Israel.
Counterpoint: Oh, and he’s anti-puppies and kitties. And ice cream. Y’all are a bunch of idiots!

DATELINE Mill Valley
I parked the car and stomped back to the table. Standing there was a very young woman dressed much like any college sophomore. I immediately began yelling at her. I went off on this woman like a Roman candle. I said the obvious: How can you compare our president to a man who systematically exterminated 6 million Jews and millions of others? How can you brazenly insult all the people who lost family in the Holocaust? As I ranted, another young woman joined the first, a cherry-cheeked redhead in her early 20s. She said if I were willing to have a “discussion” they would give me their views. “If you wanted to have a ‘discussion’” I steamed, “you wouldn’t have put up that picture. If you wanted to have a ‘discussion’ your table would feature thought-provoking quotes. What you want is for people like me to go off on you.”
This went on for a while. I yelled, the redhead flung out dubious “facts,” and they both mantra’d that Obama had gained the presidency through a coup d’état, placed into power by the British “empire.” Right there, I should have let it go. Anyone who thinks Britain is still an empire really hasn’t been paying attention. But I stayed.
Even as I ranted like a nut job, I knew I should walk away. Surely, getting such reactions was one of their objectives. The redhead said she could explain the comparison if I would stop interrupting, which was just rude. And I certainly was rude. I get like that around people who want to compare the president of the United States to the man who devised the plan to torture and exterminate entire categories of human beings.

Members from the Committee for the Republic of Canada were at Queen and Yonge Streets today raising awareness of their political party.

Yeah, it is pretty hard to remember that political party still exists.

Dateline Menlo Park When asked the significance of the image, Wesley, one of the supporters who would not share his last name, said: “We’re fighting for policy that can help us regain control of the biosphere. With this administration in office, our nation doesn’t stand a chance.”

One of the main policies about which the two were passionate was as liquid as their mood. They want the country’s water supply redirected and redistributed, so areas of the country that lack water such as Arizona would be less parched.

The group will be holding a Policy Workshop Town Hall at 2 p.m. on Sept. 17 at the Martin Luther King Library in San Jose.

The group advocates for President Barack Obama’s impeachment, the re-enactment of Glass-Steagall law that would separate commercial and investment banking and create a North American Power and Water Alliance that it says would create millions of jobs.
“We’re trying to awaken the American people,” said Angela Vullo, the press coordinator for the group. “We’re building a political movement.”
People are joining us from the Democrats because they hate Obama. They recognize that Obama’s policies are no different from Bush-Cheney.”
But Jordan Genso, chairperson of the Livingston County Democratic Party, said while some Democrats, including himself, agree with bringing back Glass-Steagall, the rest of the group’s ideas are suspect at best. He said the rhetoric of comparing Obama with Hitler shows the group can’t be taken seriously.
“That is obviously in poor taste and should not be acceptable,” Genso said. “I think they lose all credibility when they go that route. I don’t know what they are trying to achieve with these tactics.” […]
Vullo said LaRouche didn’t break any laws and that the prosecution was because of his ideas.
The group is backing six candidates for congress, including one from Michigan, Bill Roberts. Vullo said Roberts hasn’t decided which congressional district to run in. She also said should couldn’t say whether or when the group would be back in Hartland.
Cheryl Martin, a Tyrone Township Republican, stopped by the table to learn more. She said she supports the group’s idea of removing Obama……

Dateline Hartford “What offended me is that anybody would depict someone as Hitler, who was responsible for the deaths of 6 million Jews and millions of other deaths,” Dana said. “It wouldn’t matter if somebody was depicting a Republican that way; it isn’t right. I don’t care what side of the political aisle you’re on, that’s not the right way to go about it.”
Calls from the Daily Press & Argus to the LaRouche Political Action Committee’s office in Detroit and headquarters in Virginia were not returned by press time.
It is not the first time volunteers were from the LaRouche Political Action Committee have made a splash in Livingston County. In June, Fowlerville police asked Redford resident Nick Walsh to take down signs carrying the message “Dump Obama” during the funeral procession for former Fowlerville firefighter Alan Hale. Walsh said he was not targeting the funeral.

Comments: Just a little fact Dana; Moveon.org did an ad in 2004 comparing Bush to hitler. So I would hope since you don’t have a horse in the race — using your words– that you were as offended then as you are now. But I suspect that is not the case.(A comment from me… Moveon ran a contest, and this garnered two Bush-Hitler contest entries, which was then hammered forth by Fox news et al..)

There is very little difference between LaRouche & Obama on most postions of importance.
Signed Boomalot the proglib slayer

I stopped and talked to a young lady with the Hitler signs. She is so young, she has no concept of the devastation Hitler rained on the world. She had her canned responses and specious reasonings that make feable attempts to justify their (La Rouche’s) position. Maybe, she is getting minimum wage for her efforts. As the Nazi concentration camp and Holocost survivers rapidly diminish in numbers, she may never have the chance to meet one. She should go in to the Holocost Museum-Memorial and make an informed visit. Since La Rouche is 89 years old and allegedly a WWII vet, she says he knows the true story and thus makes an accurate comparision. She needs to make her own informed mind up, instead of swallowing propaganda. (which is a long forgotten word)

Breaking news in Warrenton:
The LaRouche Political Action Committee is at the DMV in Warrenton.
“We are Franklin Roosevelt Democrats,” said Edward Spannanus who is with LaRouchePAC. “We are like the Wig Party or Lincoln Republicans.”

The Old Gray Lady:Organizers said the rally was meant to be diverse, and not all of the participants were on the left. Followers of the right-wing figure Lyndon LaRouche formed a choir near Bowling Green and sang “The Star Spangled Banner” and “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Nearby, anarchists holding a red and black flag carried knapsacks, sleeping bags and tents.

And a “See here” from the Right: because he’s a “7 time DEMOCRATIC Presidential candidate”,,,, y’know like George Wallace was a three or four timer, depending on how you count it… blasts from right wing / conservative blogs.

Commenter makes the “sigh” to dispute the blogger’s point. I just watched the German movie “Blind Spot: Hitler’s Secretary.” It is a long talking-head interview with 81-year-old Traudl Junge, Hitler’s secretary from 1942-1945. Her intimate account of aspects of Hitler’s beliefs and personality indicate that the similarities between A.H. and Obama are not a joking matter. Traudl died before Obama entered public life.

As for LaRouchies, I almost made a point that the New York Times blog post inexplicably called him a “far-right figure” as if that comes even close to describing the idiosyncratic cult of personality that is LaRouche. Though he ran repeatedly as a Democrat and Labour Party candidate, he is a jumbled mess of views and his small band of supporters aren’t really representative of anything but themselves.
They were the same folks who had the Obama-Hitler mustache signs at the Tea Party events last year and the media tended to glom onto those, too, as if they were carried by the Tea Partiers

The LaRouche crew are equal opportunity event crashers.
I wish a NYT reporter would do a piece including interviews on what they think they are gaining by showing up at these divergent events.

Recall that LaRouche’s — whatever started as a splinter of the infamous SDS, then became the “Coalition of Labor Committees”, then…. So, apparently, we are expected to swallow that LaRouche’s organization used to be “extreme left”, but some time when nobody was looking the movement became “extreme right”.… Which also reminds me of the occasion when TIME identified David Duke as a “libertarian”, an identification supported by nothing whatsoever, and refused to retract it.
(dodgy reasoning, but who cares?)

Spoke too soon, this tpm commentor: They have signs that are spelled correctly, no references to the Constitution, no references to socialism or Hitler, and NO GUNS, These are not true patriots and Americans!
I note that the last time I saw Jon Stewart make a quick dig at Tea Party “Hitler” analogy posters, he went to a non-Larouchie one — probably the most prominent non-Larouche Obama Hitler poster one you get when you google — I think it’s likely in 2009, he’d have gone with the Larouchie one. Just… things to watch and pay attention to.

Organizers said the rally was meant to be diverse, and not all of the participants were on the left. Followers of the fringe political candidate Lyndon LaRouche formed a choir near Bowling Green and sang “The Star Spangled Banner” and “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Nearby, anarchists carried sleeping bags and tents.

Larouchies are leeches and are not participating in the organizing that is going on in Zuccotti Park. So, this is a nice smear but it is very cynical. Actual organizing is taking place and anyone who has any shred of idealism about living in a society where Wall Street doesn’t control the direction of politics should at the very least be intrigued.
I believe you are intrigued. You should be. But that’s why I cannot believe you lead with a photo of someone from LarouchePAC holding up an Obama is Hitler sign (which I know is from 2009 and not now). They just show up and stand by protests to get attention. What do you do? Start an altercation? Tell them to run away? Then a fight happens and police step in?
And how is what you are doing with this post any different from some right winger going to a rally like “One Nation Working Together” in October last year and taking photos of only socialists and communists in attendance and then saying “Look! This is who these people really are!”?
Your post attempts to brand them as a group inclusive of fringe lunatics who consider Obama to be Hitler. I don’t think there is any proof any serious organizers of the occupation support LarouchePAC at all.
There was Reagan as Hitler…Bush I as Hitler…Bush II as Hitler…there had to be Nixon as Hitler, too. Gerald Ford?…Chevy Chase had that covered – not a Hitler, though.

OMFG. Listen to the introduction for this radio program, sometime early in the morning in New Orleans, that interviewed Harley Schlanger. Do with the rest of it whatever you want, but that jingle… good god almighty, radio sucks.

Hm. Also Medicare wants to search your computer !

Different guest, but is there a bright demarcation there?

Also Larouche appeared on something, somewhere — but I lost the link. I’m sure he Declared Obama is the “Loser of the Century” and went from there.

The Creature from the Black Lagoon at first appears to be some type of eldritch horror risen from the depths and unable to communicate with it’s victims and giving the viewer a sense of visceral dread…..until you spot the zipper on the back of the rubber suit. In the same way followers of political and cult leader Lyndon LaRouche seem terrifying and incomprehensible with their pamphlets explaining how Al Gore is Hitler and how Dick Cheney is conspiring with Satan…until you see them singing. Then, much like the Creature from the Black Lagoon, you can’t help but laugh at them.

9 September – So how does Dr. Katereact to President Obama’s speech about creating jobs?? Why by repeating a claim by Lyndon LaRouche that Obama is mentally unfit for office!! Because Lyndon LaRouche is SO reliable a source…….if you’re completely insane that is.

Cliff Kincad — “AmericanThinker” and the anti-Communist anti-Soviet anti-Conspiracy Theorist nutcase conspiracy. Pondering the Alex Jones connection.
Considering that Russia carted WMD’s out of Iraq, compromised (via NATO) the entire OIF order of battle to Saddam Hussein’s regime, and (recently) bombed the American Embassy in Georgia, can it really be argued that Russia and it’s KGB (now FSB) have honestly changed since the “demise” of the Soviet Union? That Russia considers itself an enemy of the United States may be a profoundly unpleasant conclusion, but it is a necessary one.
One cannot help but wonder if Alex Jones unwittingly is helping the Russian FSB to incite the American right against their own country? The same tactics have worked effectively on the American left for decades.

And will the USA join the rest of the global protesters to shut this looting of civilization down with Lyndon LaRouche?
What say you?
I’ve followed LaRouche for a while now and what are you people talking about? We need to shut this speculation scam going to wall street which includes looting in the form of cutting everything in sight,this Obama is doing the cutting and making the USA bailout the vultures with the monies normally funding everything in the civilized world?
LaRouche is demanding job creation with the looted monies by shutting down the thieves with Glass-Steagall?
How does that make one “Insane”?
bring back nasa!!

larouche is a nutzoid.

Ya its the space shuttle launch thats going to wake everyone up….

La Rouche is insane and so are his followers.

@StopFear Lindon LaRouche is still around?? I remember he ran for president way back when. The supporters used to hang out at airports trying to recruit people, like Moonies. The LaRouchies published something like the Watchtower. …

Ron Paul could never win.
Wake up Ron. Admit it. You are behind the eight ball. Nothing is on public record to suggest you could win a debate against Larouche.
And YOU know it.
I’m bored of your sophistry MR PAUL.
Ron Paul would SHIT himself against such opposition. Mr Paul … prove yourself in the confines of world politics.
Have a stab Mr Paul! Take on Lyndon Larouche in battle.

Because Ron Paul and Lyndon Larouche are oh so similar:
I can see the implementation of a large internationally mutual project being an effective bridging of foreign relations, such as that of NAWAPA (proposed by Lyndon LaRouche). The LaRouche PAC team and I do not quite see eye to eye on everything (they do not endorse my support of Ron Paul, stating that they think his views on the correction of the monetary system as being “unconstitutional”, citing instead a Hamiltonian credit-based system as their one and only solution, as opposed to a gold backed monetary system. I believe this is because this credit system would be the only way they could see the NAWAPA Project being expediantly fundable. Just my suspicion, mind you, and I am not completely unresponsive to their Hamiltonian credit system, I merely choose to direct my efforts, at this time, towards a more viable and immediate solution, with that being the possibility of Ron Paul becoming President in the next election) but I only wish to pursue workable solutions for the benefit of mankind, and thus, I do promote NAWAPA. If you are not aware of it already, please check it out. It is a very interesting and promising mega-infrastructural project designed to provide water, power, transportation and fertile land to areas of the world which are currently lacking it.

Chris, I do not understand the credibility you place in LaRouche. In the course of chasing errands earlier this summer, I spotted a political table in front of the post office. I was some distance from it in the parking lot, but saw clearly a large poster of Obama with the “Hitler moustache” painted on his face. Alongside that was another poster, large lettering proclaiming, “Bring Back Glass-Steagall.” The two posters seemed, together, a contradiction: Lettering a message is very different from desecrating a photo of ANY human face.
I had never seen a political table like this, so I approached to dialog in order to learn the who, what, etc. of the messages. It took several attempts on my part to assure the young man behind the table that I was not there to argue, but to understand their point of view. At one point he said, “Okay, you’ve passed the test,” at which point it seemed to me he articulated that he believed I was sincere in wanting to understand. However, the long and short of it is, he would not inform me of any stance he held; rather, trying to hand me any number of papers to read and referring to a website of La Rouche. When I persisted in wanting to “hear from him,” he began to articulate koans. ( n in Zen Buddhism – a problem or riddle that admits no logical solution)
Other women had arrived at the table, a couple of them immediately critical of the Obama Hitler moustache. He said it wasn’t HItler’s moustache, but that of Charlie Chaplin…to which I replied, “you know very well a first reaction to this moustache would not be Charlie Chaplin…many people do not even know who Charlie Chaplin was.” When he continued responding with koans, the women simply became more frustrated with him. I explained to them what a koan was, and then the other person behind the table, a young woman who’d been talking on her cell phone the whole time, said, laughing, “You’ll never get anywhere with him, he’s a philosopher.” She, though, also did not acknowledge the questions any of us “seekers” were asking. One of the questions I had was “Who do you support, then, for President?” No answer.
I finally left, astonished that someone who had set up a political table had no interest in conversing informatively with those who showed up for information. And it troubles me that young minds are not able to function person-to-person. Truth is like pollen–carried by all of us anywhere in many forms. I, for one, am not looking for a gospel or a charismatic figure to follow. One of the things I value about the Kauilapele’s Blog is that you seem to dip and sift as I do.

“I went into the polls voting for the black guy, and what I got was the white guy.”
Bill Maher, then quoted by Michael Moore.

It’s… interesting. You can chalk it up alongside Limbaugh, but set aside in ironic quotation marks. And in this vault of commentary, I slide next to Ta Nesha Coates with the “He is within the range of what I thought he was going to be when he became President” — I am “not as low on Obama” because I was never “as high on Obama” and — a man named Michael Moore once upon a time would have known that — back in the Clinton Administration.

And about Moore — he’s the guy who got suckered into supporting Wesley Clarke in the 2004 Democratic Primary, a man whose only policy record was with some military actions, all of which Michael Moore had opposed, through the 1990s. So we jump from that to Obama (and I think Moore once upon a time knew that his political problem was bigger than Obama.)

My middling level of interest in nfl football often slides to only wanting to hear this Sunday night radio highlight session, with the announcer making — basically purposefully bad– strained puns off of team names and player names (usually the quarterback). Sure, there’s always a lot of “stories” that grab my interest — last year I was on the edge of my seat rooting for every NFL West team to lose week in and week out and doing a little jiggy after after that epic final game of the season where the league had designed the schedule to slot in a defacto division championship game and treated football fans to the sight of the Seahawks making the playoffs at 7-9. So far this season, I’m a big fan of the commentary suggesting that sans Peyton Manning, the Indianapolis Colts should just float the season away and go 0-16 and grab Andrew Luck in the draft– which would make an interesting race indeed: one that might interest this season’s iteration of the Seahawks — and one that the Colts have the upper hand due to not playing in the NFC West. The last time such a race developed — for Peyton Manning — it only took 13 losses; we’ll see if the bar of excellence has been upped to 16 in the interceding decade and a half.

But for my interest in NFL pun and cultural referencing concoctions, this one intrigues me to no end. I stumbled onto this headline, and I think I’ve found my new favorite football player.

This one might take the football commentary of Dennis Miller to handle. Kafka is the emergency third-string back-up quarterback for a qb who, pretty predictably actually, has fallen to injury — the controversial and rehabilitated Michael Vick, and came in for a spell. He is, reportedly, “ready to go” for next week. I’m sure a Lit Major can tell me what he’s doing to prepare himself.

I would say that the headline writes itself, but I can’t think of anything. I hope he stays long enough where something clearly and immediately recognizable as Kafka-esque will take place on the field — something I can’t quite come up with right now (maybe an unannounced regulatory rule change in the middle of the game?) , but I’m sure it’ll be in the Highlights Reels from here to Eternity.

A boy, wearing a green hat which is shaped like a firefighter’s hat, is playing on playground equipment, and yells to his mom. “Mommy. I want to go back home so I can put on my [did not catch] costume!”

Mom affirms the child’s wishes. “In a few minutes.” I assume she would go home shortly anyway, but it’s good that she’s in accord with her kid.

Green hat kid is with a friend. They run around the tunnel, which is apparently their gateway — or the hatted kid’s gateway — in and out of “Mushroom Land”.

His friend walks in, and announces that he is now in “Mushroom Land!”

“No you’re not. You just walked out of Mushroom Land! You go through there to enter Mushroom Land!”

I identify with this gate-keeper. There have to rules and designations of what constitutes “Mushroom Land”. Otherwise, I’d be able to claim I’m in Mushroom Land right now.

But where does this “Mushroom Land” come from? Retro-Mario Bros. fans (yes, you’re getting old — we can now call “Mario Bros” “retro”)? Is there a piece of literature they enjoyed the other day set in “Mushroom Land”? Or do they just enjoy the sound of “M” running against “ush” and then finished with that “Oom”?

Less likely, but a possibility — they picked up on older siblings’ drug habits. I suppose this kid will move out of his “Mushroom Land” phase in a fortnight — heck! It might just end when he puts on his costume when he gets home — but may just return in, let’s see… I peg him as age 7, so… he’ll return to “Mushroom Land” in, like 7… 8 years?

During childhood, they played games with fierce intensity, giving themselves as a sacrifice to the game, for play was the chief business of growth, finding and making themselves in the world. Now when they give they are too old merely to play, to what shall they give themselves with fierce intensity? They cannot play for recreation, since they have not been used up.
The proving behavior is endless. Since each activity is not interesting to begin with, its value does not deepen and it does not bear much repetition. Its value as proof quickly diminishes. In these circumstances, the inevitable tendency is to raise the ante of the compulsive useless activity that proves one is potent and not useless. (This analysis applies equally to these juveniles and to status-seeking junior executives in business firms and on Madison Avenue.)
It is not surprising then, that, as Frederic Thrasher says in The Gang, “Other things being equal, the imaginative boy has an excellent chance to become the leader of the gang. He has the power to make things interesting for them. He ‘thinks up things for us to do.'”
At this point let us intervene and see what the Official Spokesmen say.

Last summer, after a disastrous week when there were several juvenile murders, the Governor of New York made the following statement (NYT, September 2, 1959)
We have to constantly devise new ways to bring about a challenge to these young folks and to provide an outlet for their energies and give them a sense of belonging.

The statement is on the highest level of current statesmanship — that is why I have chosen it. It has been coached by sociologists and psychologists. It has the proper therapeutic and not moralistic attitude, and it does not mention the cops. (The direct appeal to force come a couple of weeks later, when there were other incidents.)

The gist of it is that the Governor of New York is to play he role that Thrasher assigns to the teen-age gang leader. He is to think up new “challenges.” (The word could not have been more unfortunate.) But it is the word “constantly” that is the clue. A challenge can hardly be worth while, meaningful, or therapeutic if another must constantly and obsessively be devised to siphon off a new threat of “energy”. Is not this raising the ante? Solidly meeting a real need does not have this character.

(“The leader” says Thrasher, “sometimes control the gang by means of summation, ie by progressively urging the members from one deed to another, until finally the extreme of some sort is reached.”)

My guess is that in playing games the Governor will not have so lively an imagination as the lad he wants to displace as leader; unlike the grownups, the gang will never select him. One of the objective factors that make it hard to grow up is that Governors are likely to be men of mediocre humane gifts.

The psychology of the Governor’s statement is puzzling. There are no such undifferentiated energies as he speaks of. There are energies of specific functions with specific objects. In the case here they might be partly as follow: in adolescents a strong energy would be sexual reaching. For these boys, as for other adolescents, it is thwarted or imperfectly gratified, but these have probably not learned so well as others to cushion the suffering and be patient; so that another strong energy of the delinquents would be diffuse rage of frustration, perhaps directed at a scapegoat. If they have been kept from constructive activity making them feel worth while, a part of their energy might be envious and malicious destructiveness of property. As they are powerless, it is spite; and as they are humiliated, it is vengeance. As they feel rejected and misunderstood by governors, their energy is woe; but they react to this with cold pride, and all the more fierce gang loyalty to their peers. For which of these specific energies does the Governor of New York seriously plan to devise an outlet? Their own imaginative gang leader presumably does devise challenges that let off steam for a few hours.

“Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin, who transformed post-Soviet Russia by imposing Kremlin control over most aspects of public life, moved on Saturday to return to the presidency and could remain until 2024, giving him a rule comparable in length with that of Brezhnev or Stalin.” … and exponentially longer than that string of rulers pre-Gorbachev post-Brehznev

The two interesting items of the Special Elections from Nate Silver: New York’s Ninth Congressional District has highly unusual demographics, with a set of local issues that are unlikely to extrapolate well to the rest of the country; the result in Nevada (“dog did not sing” quality to it) should be as troubling to Democrats as the result in New York.